So pretty much everything I said about AN OFFICER’S DUTY (EBR review) I should just cut and paste into this review…because its sequel HELLFIRE is almost the exact same book. Save yourself some time, read that review, and come back and I’ll try to be succinct. (more…)

Well then. 2013 is done. While I’m not a huge fan of the “Best Of” lists, I’ve been asked enough (by readers, authors, and even my own reviewers) that I figured I should give it a go. I’m not going to number them, as usual, and there will likely be more than 10. Why? Because I can do what I want! And stuff! (more…)

Some reviews are difficult to write. Others fly off of my fingertips near light-speed. Some are simple. Others complex. But every once in a while, I come across one that seems to just be begging for discussion of a larger issue. This book sparked one of those latter types in me. The issue: writing character versus story. (more…)

So two award-winning journalists decide to try their hand at the current craze of YA dystopian/post-apocalypse novels. But WASTELAND, by Susan Kim and Laurence Klavan, is what happens when non-fiction writers think that writing a coherent, engaging, and imaginative YA novel is not so hard. Throw in a controversial situation, maybe some race-themed antagonism, a couple of clever adjectives for spice, and voila. Easy peasy, right? (more…)

The first book of Mary Stewart’s Merlin trilogy, THE CRYSTAL CAVE, was written in 1970 and continues to be one of the most accessible novelizations of the mythos surrounding the Arthurian legends. Told in first-person PoV as though it were an autobiography, Stewart writes about Merlin’s childhood as he travels across Britain, the people he encounters, and the discovery of his magic–all in her lovely prose with detailed attention to the landscape and era. (more…)

Have you ever had a secret? I mean a delicious, wonderful secret? The kind you want to tell the whole world about and at the same time keep only for yourself? Something sweet and wonderful, something that would change other people lives if they only knew, yet at the same time you wanted to keep it all to yourself? Have you ever had one of those? (more…)